


cupcakes

by oceanterminal



Category: BanG Dream! Girl's Band Party! (Video Game)
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Character Study, Did I mention angst, F/F, Fluff and Angst, Siblings Angst, it's sayo don't @ me
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-02
Updated: 2019-03-02
Packaged: 2019-11-08 02:21:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 15,356
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17972633
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/oceanterminal/pseuds/oceanterminal
Summary: Sayo bakes cupcakes for Roselia, and everything goes to hell.A character study from Sayo's perspective, exploring her relationship with herself, with Hina, and with Tsugumi. Light fluff, angst, introspection, wrapped in a bow with a happy ending.





	cupcakes

**Author's Note:**

> here it is! i started this like, what, eight months ago? it wasn't until just recently that i managed to summon the motivation to finish it, and i'm really glad i did! this is the longest one-shot i've ever written, but i think every word is worth it. that or i'm so tired of editing it 
> 
> i hope you all enjoy this fic!! please let me know what you think in the comments :> enjoy!

Tsugumi becomes a fixture in her life as surely as guitar does, and Sayo finds her face buried in her phone more often than not (when she’s not practising the guitar, of course).

She’s very careful not to let it interfere with practice – she can feel Yukina’s eyes on her whenever it sticks out of her pocket at practise, so she tends to keep it in her bag. They know – all of them know, much to her disgust – but they’ll let it pass so long as she keeps proving her drive.

After all, that drive is what keeps Roselia together.

“You’re busy lately, Sayo, huh?” Lisa says to her, one evening as they finish practise for the night. She tilts her head as she slides her bass into its case, eyes glancing up at Sayo. A knowing smile belies her intent; it’s a statement, not a question.

“I suppose so,” Sayo says, gratifying the comment with a response against her better judgement. There’s nothing wrong with it – her hands have been seizing up lately, which means she’s probably been overdoing it, and sometimes, breaks are necessary. Breaks where she could message Tsugumi, perhaps. Not too much, though. Just enough to rest, and then back to it.

“Good for you,” Lisa says, looking over her shoulder as she trails after Yukina out the door of the studio. “You need a distraction.”

She’s wrong, of course. A distraction is the last thing Sayo needs – and this isn’t a distraction, anyway. It would be a distraction if she were taking time away from guitar to do it, but she’s not. It’s a complimentary activity – she can do it when travelling, when in school, or when she’s resting her hands. Perfectly reasonable. Perfectly appropriate.

The phone manifests in her hands as soon as the other four are gone. There’s a new message waiting for her.

tsugu: we just got some new icing if you’d like to come in again, by the way!  
Sayo: I’d like that. Are you holding another sweets classroom?  
tsugu: no, but i don’t think my mum would mind if you came over! you’re way more polite and tidy than any of afterglow  
Sayo: That’s very kind of her. I’ll be sure to thank her the next time I see her.  
tsugu: she really likes you! she keeps asking when you’re going to come over again  
Sayo: We’ll have to make it soon then, won’t we? I wouldn’t want to disappoint her.  
tsugu: :D  
Sayo: I have practise now, so I apologise if it takes me a long time to reply.  
tsugu: that’s okay!! i know your practise is super intense @~@. ttyl!  
Sayo: Goodbye.  
NEW MESSAGE  
tsugu: by the way, are yukina-senpai and lisa-senpai affectionate at roselia practise?

Sayo thinks back to roughly five minutes ago, when Lisa stared into Yukina’s eyes and begged for them to go grab dinner before heading home. She then thinks back to roughly one minute ago, as she watched them leave, holding _hands_.

Sayo: They are absolutely disgusting.

Her phone vibrates almost as soon as she leaves the studio – Tsugumi has always been a fairly fast texter. Better than Hina, anyway. _That_ one leaves her on read for hours, sometimes even days at a time. Her fingers nearly freeze in the cold air as she opens the message.

tsugu: oh noo. i’m so sorry  
Sayo: What makes you ask?  
tsugu: there was talk of doing a love song for our next original, and so i thought of you, and then i remembered minato-san and imai-san were dating! i think?

Perhaps it’s just the temperature, but Sayo’s cheeks redden. _I thought of you. I thought of you._ Stupid! Stupid.

Sayo: They are, and it is terrible.  
Sayo: There’s a couple in Afterglow, right? Aoba-san and Mitake-san, yes?  
tsugu: yeah, ran-chan and moca-chan are kind of married i think. tomoe-chan has it bad for himari-chan too, and himari-chan has it bad for her, but i don’t think himari-chan realises she likes girls yet?

Sayo steps onto her train, absentmindedly. Guitar, check, phone, check, bag, check…

Sayo: It must be strange for you, to be the only one not dating within the group.  
tsugu: it’s not like that!! ran and moca have always been close since they were little, and we’ll always be a group of five, i think…  
tsugu: it used to bother me, but i’ve been trying not to worry about it so much lately  
tsugu: they’re my best friends and they love me! there’s just a lot of kissing going on in the background i guess

Sayo wonders if the weather’s gotten a little warmer when she steps out of the train, or if it’s just her.

Sayo: They do that? In front of the rest of you?  
tsugu: sometimes!! theyre not too bad about it. i think they only do it to mess with each other. or, well, moca does.  
tsugu: she has a cold at the moment and so ran has been staying away from her  
tsugu: so after we finished a song moca kissed her all of a sudden  
tsugu: and she got snot all over ran’s face!! she was so mad, it was really funny but i felt bad for her…  
Sayo: That’s gross.  
tsugu: that’s moca for you!! himari laughed so hard she cried tho so it was a good time all around!

 _Ah_ , Sayo realises as she turns the key to the door. She’s already home. What did she do between leaving the studio and getting home…? She shrugs, and steps inside, kicking her shoes off at the door and climbing the stairs to her room. The heating is on, which means Hina is home. If she’s quiet, Hina won’t notice she’s come home, and she can be left in peace to indulge in...a perfectly appropriate chat with Tsugumi. She is _not_ going to ‘flirt’, or whatever Lisa insinuated she was doing a few days ago.

Sayo: Your band certainly sounds lively.

She sits down on her band, props a pillow up and leans back. Guitar practise is at the back of her mind, but she did only just get home from practise. She can wait a little before she starts up again.

tsugu: yeah, there’s always stuff going on. it helps that we can sit back and laugh a lot about how we’re going, i think. i’m not sure any of us could cope with roselia’s level of intensity @~@  
Sayo: True. We were very careful when selecting members. I don’t have any doubt they’re willing to work as hard as Minato-san and I do.  
Sayo: More importantly, do you feel better about your place in afterglow? I recall when we were making sweets you mentioned you felt unsure of things.  
Sayo: I can’t imagine the pairings around you make that any easier.  
tsugu: yeah, i think so!! theyve been taking extra steps to include me after i talked to ran like you suggested  
tsugu: they’re still my best friends and i love them!! they just don’t want to kiss me and frankly i don’t want to kiss them!! especially moca, she’s gross

Oh no. With this set-up, it would be...a _shame_ to let such an opportunity fly. It simply cannot be helped. Just this once, she is going to flirt.

Sayo: And you want to kiss me?

She’s certain to fluster her with a comment like that – Tsugumi is incredibly endearing when put on the spot in this sort of way. It’s one part of why she likes her – though there are a great number of good things about her.

tsugu: hm, probably!! :>

Sayo throws her phone against the wall.

_That was not the expected reaction. That was not the expected reaction!! Aaaaah!!!!_

Her brief moment of sheer [redacted] is interrupted when _of course_ someone knocks at her door.

“Hey, _onee-chan_ , are you home?” Hina poke her head through the door. Sayo frowns, “Ah, what was that noise? Are you okay?”

“I’m fine, Hina,” Sayo says, creasing her brow, “You can leave me be.”

“Aw, but I had the best idea today at school! I waited all day to tell you!” Hina says, pouting. She still hasn’t stepped properly inside the room, but if she puts any more weight on the door it’ll tear off its hinges. Sayo sighs. She doesn’t get a choice in listening, apparently.

“We should practise guitar together!” Hina says, bouncing on her heels, “We’re playing the same instrument, after all, and I bet we’d sound really good together, so I – “

“ _No_ ,” Sayo says, surprising even herself with the venom in her voice, but she doesn’t back down. “Get out of my room, Hina.”

Hina blinks for a second, before laughing it off and closing the door. “Ahaha, I figured you’d say that. Worth a shot, though!! Maybe later.”

_That was mean._

Hina is being cruel, though. Practise together? So she can show off how fantastically talented she is with no effort at all?

_She just wants to spend time with you._

That’s all they ever do! Sayo can’t do anything without Hina barging in without consent and inserting herself into the equation. Guitar was supposed to be her _thing_ , and then Hina went and copied her like always, and –

_She really loves you._

Sayo knows that, but –

_It’s not fair._

It’s not _fair!_

Sayo picks up her phone from the far wall. There’s a scarcely-noticeable new dent in it; a reminder of something stupid. She won’t do that again.

tsugu: was that too much? i’m sorry, sayo-chan  
Sayo: No, it’s fine. Hina came in. I think I’m going to practise for the rest of the night.  
Sayo: I’ll talk to you later.  
tsugu: okay! mom says you can come over tomorrow, if you’d like! i don’t think you have Roselia practise then, so if that works for you then let me know at some point!

At the very least, it’s comforting to know that Tsugumi doesn’t poke or prod where she shouldn’t. The girl has a natural knack for knowing exactly when and where to leave things be.

(Unlike _someone_.)

Sayo unzips her guitar case, plugs in her headset, and strums away. The progression in the chorus of _Nesshoku Starmine_ has been bothering her for a little while now — it’s technically fine, but there’s places where she’s a half-beat off, and that’s not acceptable. Not for Roselia, not for Yukina, and certainly not for herself.

It takes her a while to feel things out, but after an hour or two it feels natural, and she doesn’t have to think when she plays it — at least for that part. Her fingers are aching by the time she puts her guitar down, which isn’t particularly good. She has been a little concerned about overdoing it recently.

Yukina had recommended one of those grip things, to help her finger strength. Perhaps she should go pick one of those up. It’d be easy to do in her down time, after all.

“ _Onee-chan_! Dinner’s ready!” Hina calls, barging in this time with a huge grin on her face. Sayo nearly drops her headphones. “You’re coming down to eat tonight, right? You promised!”

Sayo exhales, creasing her brow. How many times has she told Hina not to enter her room without knocking? Not that she ever listens.

...still. She _did_ promise to have a proper family dinner, just like Hina wanted. Her hands _have_ been hurting, and she should listen to her body when it aches. There’s no point in practising through pain. It’ll just make things worse for her down the line.

“Alright, I’m coming,” Sayo concedes with a huff, lifting herself up off the bed and reaching for her guitar case. “I’ll be down in a second.”

“Hehe, yayyy!” Hina disappears out the door, and Sayo can tell from her footsteps down the stairs that she’s in a really good mood. Once her guitar is safely secured on its stand, she heads down the stairs, takes her seat at the dinner table.

Hina and her mother are chatting away about _Pastel*Palettes_ , whilst her father brings food in from another room.

“I heard you have another signature session with Aya-chan, don’t you, Hina?” her mother says, in that _gushing_ voice she reserves only for Hina. “Make sure you’re not wearing yourself too thin.”

“I’m fine, mom,” Hina says, throwing her hands behind her back, “It’s easy stuff, yeah?” She’s leaning back in her chair, putting it on two legs — that’s _dangerous_ , Hina.

“Your next performance in on Saturday, isn’t it? Your father and I have requested time off to come watch you.”

Oh.

“Mmhmm, yeah. We’re performing _Hikaru Nara_ for the first time live — it’s gonna be pretty exciting,” Hina says, rocking in her chair.

“Sayo, when’s your next performance? We haven’t seen you play,” her mother asks, reaching out and touching her arm gently.

“This Friday,” Sayo says, coolly, “at five, at CiRCLE.”

“Oh…” her mother trails off, and after an uncomfortable silence Sayo realises she probably should have just said nothing at all. ‘We haven’t planned it yet’ or ‘the date hasn’t been confirmed’. Something like that would have made it easier for everyone. She hadn’t even told them, anyway. It wasn’t their fault. If she wanted them to come, she should make it easy for them. If anyone’s to blame, it’s her.

It still hurts, though.

“We’ll come to see the next one,” her father says, bringing curry out from the kitchen and doing his best to save the situation, “we’ve just got to see you play. You two are so _talented_.”

Sayo clenches her fists, quietly, when she hears that word. ‘Talent’. Talent belongs to those who are naturally gifted — people like Hina.

Not people like her. She’s not talented. Sayo clawed her way to skill from zero talent, and it _shows_ . Roselia is incredible, and if not for her efforts — for _everyone’s_ efforts — they wouldn’t be the same. She’s proud of them — maybe even of herself, too. This is the first time her efforts have really, truly come to fruition, and she’s determined to see this one through.

“Well, anyway, Hina, we’re very proud of you. You’ve done such a good job of balancing work with school.”

Ah. Back to praising Hina, as usual. How foolish of her to expect the topic might change.

Sayo quietly finishes her meal, and excuses herself for the night.

* * *

The next day is a new one, and school passes by her in a blink. Sayo texts Tsugumi in between classes and sometimes, if she’s feeling particularly rebellious, in them. She’s studied this section of class anyway.

Really, she’s just watching the clock tick down until school is over, and she can spend some time baking with Tsugumi. The last time she brought in baking to practise, everyone played a little better than normal. It’s good to know she can do something to support the other members, like they support her. It didn’t hurt to spend a little time with Tsugu, either.

tsugu: i’ll meet you at the station!! i can’t wait :>  
Sayo: I’m looking forwards to it as well.  
Sayo: What kinds of things shall we make today?  
tsugu: hmm...  
tsugu: they’re for roselia, right?  
Sayo: Indeed. Everyone performed really well that practise when I gave them with the cookies after the sweets classroom. I thought I might see if it works again.  
tsugu: aw, that’s so nice!! your band must really love you, huh  
tsugu: whenever i make cookies for afterglow they spend half the session eating them and we never do any actual practise…  


_Your band must really love you, huh._ Now that’s a sentence Sayo doesn’t quite get.

Sayo: I don’t know exactly what you mean?  
tsugu: ah, well. it just seems to have really lifted their spirits that you went and did that for them!  
tsugu: i think most girls would like to receive cookies, but there’s something about receiving them from someone you care about!  
tsugu: maybe it’s like...they’re really happy you’re working extra hard for them, or something?  
Sayo: Perhaps. It felt like a different sort of happiness than when I master a difficult solo, though.  
tsugu: hmm…

She’s jolted out of her daydream by a flash of familiar cyan and an equally familiar, grating voice.

“ _Oneeeee-chan_ ~!” Hina yells, manifesting right in front of Sayo as if by magic. Sayo stops in her tracks, leans back so as not to crash right into her.

“Hina!” Sayo hisses, as people from the street start to turn and stare. Her cheeks flush, “What are you doing?”

“I have today off practise and I know you do too,” Hina says, clasping her hands behind her back, “so I thought we could hang out!! You’re not doing anything else, _ri~ight_?”

Sayo grits her teeth at the insinuation she doesn’t have plans. Hina doesn’t mean it — she _knows_ that — but it stills breeds ugly feelings inside of her that Sayo has to work to squash down.

“Actually, I have plans,” she says, stiffly, “so I can’t spend time with you today, Hina.”

“Whaaat,” Hina says, pouting, holding her bag in front of her and wobbling her lip like a little lost puppy, “you’re not just saying that because you’re being moody again, are you?”

 _Count to ten, Sayo. Count to ten._ She’s not _moody_. She just has better things to do than waste time with Hina.

(But isn’t she wasting time with Tsugumi, too?)

That’s different. It’s for the band. Probably. _Ugh_.

“Hazawa-san has generously offered to help me make sweets,” Sayo says, levelling her tone as much as she can, “We are meeting at the station.”

Hina slumps, visibly disappointed, before throwing her hands behind her head and sighing.

“Aaah geez, and I ran the whole way here…” she says, rocking on her heels, before switching track immediately, grinning all of a sudden, “Wait, you can just make me something to make up for it!! Mmm, I can’t wait!! See you at home!!”

And then Hina is going, and she’s gone, and Sayo scarcely has a moment to collect her thoughts before she processes it. Well. Alright.

tsugu: im at the station now! how far away are you?  
Sayo: Just a few minutes. Hina tried to drag me away to hang out. Luckily I had plans with you.  
tsugu: ah, is she being like that again…  
tsugu: i bet she’d calm down if you made her something :>

“I expect she would,” Sayo says, and Tsugumi jumps ten feet.

“Aa-ah! Hi! There you are,” she says, shaking a little. Sayo almost feels bad for scaring her, but it was kind of — fun? Like she’s teasing her. Is that flirting? No, no way. “You scared me.”

“Sorry about that,” Sayo says, tilting her head. Something that suspiciously resembles a smile spreads across her face, “You were so focused on your phone, I felt I had to do something to get your attention.”

“Ah! That’s — well,” Tsugumi stammers, “I just like talking to you, is all. We go to different schools and we always have band practise, so I don’t get to see you very often, so the only way I get to talk to you usually unless we make plans is to text you...which I really like doing.”

 _Ah._ There it is again. Sayo feels her face go warm, and Tsugumi’s grinning but it’s not teasing, it’s just genuine. She reaches from her phone, types into it quickly and stashes it away in her pocket again. Tsugumi’s phone buzzes, and she checks it, curiously.

Sayo: I like talking to you too.

There’s something so _lovely_ about hearing Tsugumi giggle. It distracts her so much that she scarcely notices as the girl takes her hand and tugs her towards the train. It’s leaving in the next few minutes — Sayo feels like she should be embarrassed or more proper or _something_ , but it’s the perfect excuse so she lets her hand linger a little longer than it needs to. Tsugumi doesn’t let go, and then they’re holding hands on the train, and Sayo has to force herself to think about the conversation at hand, and not that she’s doing the exact same thing she was scoffing at Lisa and Yukina for just yesterday. She’s holding _hands_ with Tsugumi. What if her hands are sweaty? Oh no, they’re definitely sweaty. What if Tsugumi notices? She’ll definitely notice.

“I was thinking, Sayo-san,” Tsugumi starts to ramble, animated and excited, “what about cupcakes? This new icing we have, it’s buttercream, and works best on cakes. Actual cakes are difficult to share, so I thought something small and easy to carry around like that might be the best, especially if you wanted to share them with Roselia and Hina-senpai. What do you think?”

There’s a quiet confidence in her eyes that only comes out on occasion, but it warms Sayo’s heart to see it.

“Cupcakes sound like a wonderful idea,” she squeezes Tsugumi’s hand ever-so-slightly, “Hazawa-san.” She can feel the girl’s breath hitch.

Realistically, perhaps they should have have switched up honorifics by now — how long had she been paying attention to Tsugumi before they’d switched even to given names? It was so foreign for Sayo — even Roselia weren’t on a first-name basis; instinctively, she’d call her Hazawa-san in public whenever she was brought up. So it shouldn’t matter, not really, if they were a little more intimate in private.

Perhaps she’d try that today, or was that — no, no. Maybe? No. No, no no. Too soon.

It’s not far from the train station to the Hazawa Bakery; Sayo scarcely catches her breath in between talking about this or that, and — their hands detach at some point too, but Sayo maybe doesn’t mind so much because that’s a little — it’s the sort of thing she has to prepare for, and she wasn’t really prepared for that, and Tsugumi’s hands are just so warm, so…

“ _Okaa-san_ , we’re home!” Tsugumi says, as the bells on the door jingle. Sayo hates how it makes her feel a certain way — _we’re home_. Ugh. Ugh!! It reminds her of the way Lisa and Yukina talk to each other. Awful.

“Oh, welcome home!” Tsugumi’s mother is all-too-friendly as always, and Sayo is almost thrown off-guard as she darts forwards and grabs Sayo’s hands in greeting. Tsugumi really hadn’t been kidding.

“I’ll handle the store, don’t worry about that,” she says, pushing the two of them towards the kitchen, “You two just get to baking! I can’t wait to see what you make~”

Tsugumi looks downright bashful as she shuts the door behind her.

“Haha, she’s really excited to see you, I think,” Tsugumi says, red-faced. Sayo isn’t quite sure how to interpret all of — that, but it’s definitely a good thing, right? Probably.

“Mm,” is all she manages to say in the end, whilst Tsugumi darts to the other side of the (huge!) kitchen and takes two aprons off the hook.

“I-if you’re going to be coming over lots, Sayo-san, we should get you your own apron,” Tsugumi says, the flush gone from her face and she’s back to brimming with quiet confidence again. This really is Tsugumi’s element, huh? “My mother and father and I all have our own personal one — see, mine has dolphins, my favourite animal!”

Sayo bends over to take a closer look at the apron — it’s a light blue, with tiny dolphins around the rim like a border. Tsugumi is almost buzzing with excitement — it does make her little _(a lot)_ happy to see Tsugumi so...sunny? Is that the right word? Ugh, _feelings_.

“It’s cute,” Sayo says, wondering if that’s enough encouragement but Tsugumi beams and turns away, pulling out bowls and ingredients from the cupboards in a whirlwind of organised chaos. Sayo can scarcely follow what’s happening with her eyes.

“Right! We should get you one, don’t you think?” Tsugumi says, reaching for something in a high cupboard above the oven and struggling a little, and Sayo feels that urge only tall people can have when they see a shorter person they like struggling to reach something high up. She darts over to the cupboard, reaches past Tsugumi, and pulls a recipe book out.

“Here,” she says, feeling kind of proud of herself, like she’s done something cool. She’s helping!

“Ah,” Tsugumi says, “it’s actually the other one.”

She is not helping.

Sayo hates herself for feeling so proud of pulling out the _wrong book_ but places it back and retrieves the other, handing it to Tsugumi wordlessly as if she didn’t just pull out the wrong book. Her hip knocks the oven handle as her hands come back down, and just — ugh. Her cheeks burn with shame. What a mess. She goes back to what they were talking about before, trying to regain some semblance of composure.

“If you don’t mind coming with me, I wouldn’t mind buying an apron,” she says, as they walk back to the counter, utensils and ingredients set in place. “I’ve been thinking I should practise at home when I get a little better at this —“ she pauses, “— would you try eating some, if I did?”

Tsugumi’s eyes light up at the prospect, and Sayo is — well. She’s concerned it won’t even be _edible_ without Tsugumi’s help, but even still, she wants to try. She can always fob the bad ones off on Hina, anyway.

“I’d love to!” Tsugumi says, grinning with her whole face. It’s kind of — sort of — too much. She looks away before more thoughts happen in some sort of indecent manner.

“I’m glad,” Sayo says, watching as Tsugumi flicks through pages of the recipe book. It’s handwritten, filled with old scraps of paper glued into place, and newer recipes too, at the back. Tsugumi stops near the end of the book, at a page titled ‘Red Velvet Cupcakes’. “When I get around to it, I’ll bring you some.”

“I’m really looking forward to it,” Tsugumi says, voice soft, and runs her finger down the list of ingredients. “Hmm, we start with the dry ingredients, and sift them together into a bowl. Can you do that,Sayo-san? I’ll handle the wet ingredients.”

Sayo nods, peering at the recipe for measurements. The dry ingredients are — cocoa, flour, salt, and baking powder. Easy enough; she’s used all of these before except for cocoa, but that’s just chocolate powder, right? It does help that Tsugumi’s laid them all out on the benchtop.

“Hazawa-san,” she says, as she starts to measure things over the sieve, “are all of your recipes handwritten?”

“Yeah!” Tsugumi says, from the other side of the kitchen, over the noise of an electric mixer, “A lot of our recipes are really old family ones. They’re all unique to us! Though if we see a really good recipe, we write it down in the experimental recipe book.”

“Experimental?”

“Yeah! Not all recipes are perfect, so when we’re adding new ingredients to the menu, we like to test things out and change things to make them a little better. Sometimes it’s as small as adjusting the amount of an ingredient, but other times we like to add entirely new ingredients, or remove some, or a lot of things. We experiment!”

Sayo focuses on measuring out the ingredients exactly, trying to find preciseness in each measurement. Experimenting, huh…

In all honesty, it sounds rather difficult. How exactly were you meant to know what would improve something, or what would worsen it? Was it a matter of taste learned over years of baking and eating sweets? Or was it a low-level skill she hadn’t picked up yet?

...come to think of it, had she ever really put much thought into what ingredients went into the food she ate? She’d had fries for lunch, which was just potatoes, but — salt, for taste, and...oil, to cook it in? Vegetable oil? Olive oil? Sayo doesn’t even know what olive oil is used for. She makes a mental note to look that up once she gets home.

“Sayo-san, are you done with the dry ingredients?” Tsugumi calls, stepping up beside Sayo all of a sudden, “I wanted your help with the next step.”

Sayo holds up her bowl full of flawlessly sieved ingredients for inspection, a sort of pretty pastel brown colour with the cocoa and flour mixed together. Tsugumi gives her a thumbs up, and something awfully — _mmmm_ — flares up in her chest. She ignores it. Mm.

“Next we need to combine the wet ingredients and the dry ones, alongside the buttermilk and food colouring...do you want to mix, or pour the ingredients?” Tsugumi says, tugging her by the apron towards the wet ingredients and electric mixer. Sayo’s never touched one before — though she vaguely remember seeing her mother use one when she was younger.

“I’ll mix,” she says, because it seems like the more difficult task and she _is_ , after all, here to learn.

“Have you mixed before?”

“No,” Sayo says, taking grip on the mixer. She aims the blades away from them, and presses the button on the handle. The mixer whirs to life with — a surprising amount of force.

“I think it’s on the highest setting right now,” Tsugumi says, bringing the mixer down with Sayo’s hands and fumbling for a notch at the top, “For this stage, we just want a medium setting.”

It clicks, and Sayo tests the force of it again. This time, it’s a little easier to control, but it’s still stronger than she first expected. Electric mixers are kind of powerful. Possibly dangerous, too…

“Are you ready?” Tsugumi asks, smiling at her and holding the dry ingredients near the wet. Sayo nods, grounding the bowl with one hand, mixer in the other. Tsugumi pours in what looks like roughly a third of the dry ingredients, and suddenly mixing becomes a lot harder. The blades whir against the metal bowl, and struggle with the new addition. The mixture becomes kind of — thicker, somehow, and Sayo isn’t quite sure if she’s doing it right.

“Here, Sayo-san,” Tsugumi’s voice says, and Sayo feels hands press gently on hers, guiding her mixing hand in circles, “if you do it like this, it’s a bit easier.”

“Oh,” Sayo says, ignoring the rush of heat to the tips of her ears and focusing on mixing the ingredients to perfection. It feels a little cold, a moment later, when Tsugumi’s hands leave hers.

Next comes the buttermilk and food colouring, and it gets a little easier again, because the mixture is a bit thinner, and oh, this is why they’re called red velvet, Sayo realises, as the food colouring tints the mixture a deep pink. They repeat twice more, until the dry ingredients are gone and the mixture is a deep, deep red. It looks kind of good — there’s a small part of Sayo that kind of wants to taste it, even though it hasn’t been cooked yet. It smells good, too.

“Mm, that looks so pretty!” Tsugumi says, resting her elbows on the countertop, “I’ve never made red velvet before...it’s such a nice red, don’t you think?”

Sayo nods, mumbling an ‘mm’ in reply as she focuses very firmly on the task at hand, and tries not to be distracted by Tsugumi’s warm breath on her shoulder, and —

“That should do it, I think!” Tsugumi says, picking up the recipe book and running her finger down the page, “That looks about thoroughly mixed. Next, the dry ingredients...Sayo-san, could you scrape the batter off the blades, so we don’t waste any?”

So this is what thoroughly mixed looks like, Sayo thinks as she scrapes the blades with a dinner knife (it’s an inelegant affair). She tries to note down the texture in her head for later — totally smooth, no lumps, but still thick — or is this the sort of thing that would change per recipe? The batter got thicker and thinner when they added the dry and wet ingredients, so maybe the viscosity of the batter wasn’t a good indicator of being thoroughly mixed. She sighs. This sort of thing is kind of...difficult to understand.

“Hazawa-san,” she says, furrowing her brow, “is this what all batter should look like when thoroughly mixed?”

Tsugumi nods, grabbing a wooden spatula and taking the bowl in Sayo’s hands — again, this time, covering Sayo’s hands with her own. Sayo wonders if she’s doing it on purpose, because it makes her feel a certain way that isn’t really appropriate for baking, when there’s utensils and ingredients about, and a time limit.

She doesn’t hate it, though. Definitely not.

“You can tell something is thoroughly mixed,” Tsugumi says, folding the mixture with the spatula, “when there’s no lumps, and when you stir it like this, there’s no parts of the mixture that are drier or wetter than any other part. It’s a lot easier with an electric mixer, but for this next part, we have to mix by hand. Would you like to try?”

Sayo nods, and Tsugumi presses the spatula into her hands, but holds her position just behind Sayo for just a moment, arms circling her but not holding her, an almost-intimacy that she sort of wishes was a little bit more, and at the same time this — isn’t the time, and she shouldn’t even be _thinking_ about that, and the more she does, the more her stomach twists at the thought, and the more Sayo really just wants to focus on the recipe and making sure it’s done properly.

And then Tsugumi is gone, off to fetch something else, and Sayo releases a breath she doesn’t realise she was holding, and feels a little silly for making such a big deal out of it.

“I’ll just combine the baking soda and vinegar, and then we need to mix it through the batter,” Tsugumi says, measuring out a teaspoon of white vinegar. It fizzes as the baking soda disintegrates into it with a quiet hissing noise.

“Now, I need you to mix all of this in,” Tsugumi says, pouring the fizzing mixture into the batter, and Sayo is determined to do all of this right — if she remembers right, this is the last step before they actually bake the cupcakes. She mixes firm and fast, the first few strokes a little clumsy, but she finds she gets the hang of it, scraping at the edges of the bowl to make sure it’s _thoroughly_ mixed.

And then, it’s done.

“Mm, that looks really good, Sayo-san!” Tsugumi says, with a grin on her face that’s a little too much, and despite that Sayo allows herself to indulge it in anyway. “We just need to pour in into the cupcake tray, and wait for it to bake. The oven is already pre-heated.”

Sayo hadn’t even thought about the oven, but — it made sense. The oven needed to warm up first, and if they only turned it on when putting the cupcakes inside, they wouldn’t be cooked evenly. Another thing to note down for when she tries this on her own. It does seem a little daunting, but she’s learned a lot, even just baking with Tsugumi twice. If Lisa can do it, then — she must be able to as well.

Pouring the batter into the cupcake tray is a sort of arduous affair — Tsugumi places cute cupcake liners in purples, blues and blacks — Roselia’s colours. Sayo can’t help the small smile that creeps to her face, because it’s so awfully wonderful to be thought of like that. It’s kind of nice to feel secure in knowing Tsugumi had been looking forwards to this as much as she had — because she had been looking forwards to it, sincerely. Guitar is her everything, but having something else to do that helps Roselia and at the same time breaks up her everyday routine is...really nice.

Sayo doesn’t quite get all of it right — some of the cupcakes are definitely larger than the others, and Tsugumi’s are terribly perfect, but Tsugumi tells her not to worry, they’ll look wonderful with some icing on the front and it doesn’t affect the taste, anyway. It still bothers her a little bit — they’re going to look imperfect in the box when she presents them, but if Tsugumi says so, she can try not to worry about for just a little while.

They slide them into the oven, placing the rest of the batter in the fridge — “It keeps the batter fresh, so we can do a second batch!” — and then it’s time to clean the utensils, and it’s a kind of peaceful process. Tsugumi is as wonderfully instructive as she’s been all day, and even though it’s just cleaning, Sayo still feels like she’s learning as she goes.

The timer goes off after 20 minutes, and Sayo is kind of thrilled to pull them out of the oven, just like last time, but — oh.

They don’t smell right, and they don’t look right, either.

The cupcakes aren’t burned, per se, they’re not black — but when Tsugumi presses a finger to the top, they’re harder than they should be, and they don’t smell quite as good as they should, and Sayo can feel her shoulders droop a little.

“That’s strange,” Tsugumi says, creasing her brow in a way that worries the rest of her face, and Sayo kind of wants to put her own disappointment aside and comfort the girl, even though — even though. “I guess the temperature wasn’t right quite — ah!”

Tsugumi peers down at the knobs on the oven, sighing, “The temperature is set a little too high. Sorry, Sayo-san. I didn’t mean to ruin your first batch of cupcakes.”

It hits Sayo like a flash, and she realises that — no, this is almost certainly not Tsugumi’s fault.

“Hazawa-san,” she says, stomach lurching, “I think the fault is mine —”

“No, it’s okay! You’re only just learning, so I was the one to set the oven. I should have been a better teacher — “

Sayo feels her face burn as she reaches out, placing her hands on Tsugumi’s shoulders. The girl stops talking, blinks twice. Sayo’s word take a moment longer to form than she’d hoped.

“When I reached for that recipe book, I knocked my hip against the oven,” she says, fixating her gaze into Tsugumi, determined to, at the very least, be culpable for her own mistakes and make sure the girl doesn’t worry, “At that time, I probably knocked the temperature knob as well. The fault is mine. I’m sorry for wasting your time and ingredients.” Sayo drops her hands, folds them together and bows slightly.

After the briefest of pauses, Tsugumi laughs, a light and airy sound, like the wind-chimes on the front door of the cafe.

“There’s no need to apologise, Sayo-san,” she says, taking Sayo’s hands in her own and running her thumb over the backs, “after all, we still have half the batter left, right?”

It’s times like this that Sayo is endlessly grateful for Tsugumi’s incredible ability to bounce back from any kind of defeat. Afterglow is rather lucky to have her, she thinks.

(Sayo feels she’s rather lucky to have her, too.)

“We do,” Sayo says, and the knot in her stomach loosens a little. Tsugumi adjusts the temperature, and they start again, placing the not-quite-right cupcakes on a cooling tray regardless. She can put a few aside for Hina, but the rest should be for Roselia. Sincerely, she doubts Hina will notice the difference.

This time, when the cupcakes come out of the oven, Tsugumi’s eyes shine with glee. She inserts a wooden skewer into the centre of one, and it comes out clean — which Sayo presumes is a good thing?

“They’re perfect, Sayo-san,” Tsugumi says, clasping her hands with joy, and there’s a sense of pride of Sayo’s chest, even though she made so many mistakes to begin with, because she made it in the end.

The cupcakes are hot to touch, so the two of them place them on a cooling tray besides the others (carefully segregated, mind you), and then it’s time for the icing. It’s something Sayo has some degree of experience with, at least — so it’s a little easier to follow along as Tsugumi guides her through the process. Mix the cream cheese, the sugar, the vanilla extract with the mixer. Whip the cream separately (she lets Tsugumi handle that one). Then, fold the cream in the mixture by hand. Sayo doesn’t quite know what the recipe means by folding, but Tsugumi shows her the hand movements and it’s not too difficult, just — a little more tricky to grasp than the rest, and then it’s done, and all they have to do is pipe the icing in swirls on top.

“It’s important to let cupcakes cool before you ice them,” Tsugumi says, icing one cupcake, then handing the reins over to Sayo. “Otherwise, the icing won’t set properly, and all that presentation you worked so hard on might go to waste.”

Sayo nods fervently as she takes the pipe, and squeezes gently at the ends. The icing comes out faster than expected, and it all comes out, missing the cupcake entirely. Tsugumi laughs again, and Sayo feels an awful haze come over her cheeks, hot and — ugh. She tries again, and it’s easier this time, but she still notices the differences between the ones Tsugumi ices and the ones she ices.

And then they’re done — Tsugumi gives her a pretty tin to carry them around in.

“If we wrap them, the icing will smudge. It’s better to have a hard carry case for cupcakes, I think,” Tsugumi says, handing Sayo the box. Tsugumi’s only kept a few for herself — Sayo worries her lip at the thought.

“You’re fine with letting me take this many?” she says, taking the box tentatively in her hands, brow still knit and eyes on Tsugumi, but the girl smiles and nods.

“They’re your special cupcakes to help Roselia, right? I’m sure you’ll need as many as you can carry,” she says, with a tone so sweet Sayo doesn’t think any cupcake could compare. “I don’t know Lisa-senpai that well, but from what Moca says, I think she’ll be really excited. The rest of Roselia, too.”

She really is kind, Sayo thinks, on the train back home. She’d said goodbye to Tsugumi’s mother with a polite bow, and received a smile so Tsugu-like in return that she can’t help but wonder if all of Tsugumi’s family is a little bit like her. What a wonderful family, she thinks. So kind, and so warm.

It’s not that Sayo doesn’t love her own family, of course she does, it’s just — difficult. With Hina as she was, it was never going to be quite so happy. Realistically, even if Hina hadn’t been born so innately talented at anything and everything, this problem would have come up eventually. One of them would be better than another at some things, or all things, and that jealousy and guilt would crop up all the same.

Perhaps twins just don’t get to play happy families. Maybe it’s a sister problem. Then again, Ako and Tomoe were as close as could be, and they were so close in age, too.

Maybe it’s just Sayo.

She walks through the door at home, and the kitchen is empty — but she can hear Hina practising in her room, and she tries not to grit her teeth. She leaves the cupcakes on the counter, and walks halfway up the stairs before Hina realises she’s home and darts over to her, excited.

“ _Onee-chan_ !!” she says, with glee in her voice that pricks thorns in Sayo’s stomach for ever thinking ill of her, because how _could_ she – “Did you make stuff? Can I eat it?”

Sayo sighs.

“Yes, I did, and yes, you can eat it,” she says, stepping back down to the kitchen and beckoning for Hina to follow. Hina’s so animated, like this is the most exciting thing to _ever_ happen and, well – did she really like those cookies all that much?

Sayo opens the box, and extracts three cupcakes, placing them in front of Hina, who’s – salivating. Gross.

“I made three for you, and two for Mum and Dad,” Sayo says, as Hina shoves the first one into her mouth. “The rest are for Roselia.”

“Ish goowd!!” Hina yells through an entire cupcake, crumbs flying everywhere. Sayo frowns.

“Don’t talk with your mouth full,” she scolds. Hina nods, and shoves the rest of the cupcake into her mouth, and swallows it faster than Sayo thought humanly possible, but – well, it’s Hina.

“It’s good!!! Really good!!” Hina says, eyes shining like she’s never seen anything better, and it’s kind of flattering and maybe, maybe Sayo’s a little proud of herself this time. They _are_ good cupcakes – at least, they certainly look the part (not that Hina likely paid much attention, considering how fast she inhaled it).

“I’m glad you like them,” Sayo says, tempering her pride. Hina did have a tendency to be blunt, so she’d know if they were truly bad, but for all her talents, assessing the talent of others wasn’t one. Which meant that Hina would always say Sayo was better than she was – at guitar, at baking, at anything.

(Sayo can’t hide the small smile on her face, though.)

The door opens again, and oh, her parents are home. It’s kind of cute how they always arrive home together – they work at different places, but finish at the same time, and catch the train home together.

(She thinks it’d be nice if, maybe, one day, in the future, she and Tsugumi could – )

“We’re home,” their mother says, “oh, Hina, did you make cupcakes?”

Sayo feels thorns dig a little deeper at her sides.

“Nooo, mom, _onee-chan_ made them!!” Hina says, jumping instantly to her defense, but the damage is done. She breathes in, out, counts to five, and nods along with Hina.

“There’s one each for you two,” she says, but it’s a little softer than it should be. They eat the cupcakes, and give her all the praise she desires, so it should be fine, but something in her stomach sticks each time she remembers that they thought Hina had baked them – not her.

Sayo sighs into her guitar as she practises. It’s her own fault anyway. It’s not like she told them she’d started baking – she’d kept that her quiet secret, except that was pointless because Hina found out anyway, and then it backfired in her face. How typical.

Really, though, why should she care what her parents think? They’re not bakers. They don’t know what’s good or not. It makes sense to assume it’s Hina, anyway – she’s the one always picking up weird new hobbies out of the blue. It’s unlike Sayo to ever...do anything different, really.

So there’s no point in getting upset about it. After all, they’re cupcakes for Roselia. If they help Roselia practise better, then she’s done her job, and it wasn’t a waste of time.

And, well, it’s not bad to be a little proud of that, is it? She’ll hand them over to them all, and Ako will react first, probably just like Hina, and maybe Rinko will give her that look, like she did with the cookies, that made Sayo feel kind of fuzzy inside, and maybe Lisa will sling her arm around her, even though it was kind of annoying, and maybe Yukina will look a little like she does when she’s eating Lisa’s cookies – maybe. Not that it matters, if none of that happens. As long as it helps Roselia practise.

She makes her way down to the kitchen, hours after dinner’s over and her parents have gone to bed. Her fingers ache in that awful way they do when she practises just a little too hard, but as long as she stops now, it’ll be fine. She’s thirsty, anyway — a glass of water before bed and she can sit down and message Tsugumi a little, maybe. Five steps down the stairs and she’s humming her way to the cupboards, pulls out a glass, takes a sip. What would she say to Tsugumi today…? ‘Thanks for the help with baking’? No, no, that’s too — formal, stiff, Lisa would tell her (as much as Sayo hates it, Lisa Imai _does_ know how to people a lot better than she does). She looks at the cupcakes still lying on the countertop for inspiration. Maybe…’I hope you enjoyed yourself today. I know I did.’ Aaah, wasn’t that a little too bold? Mm…

“ _Onee-chan!!_ ” Hina says, suddenly, in her ear. Sayo counts to ten and manages somehow not to leap ten feet. “Whatcha doin’?” Sayo heaves a sigh.

“I’m just grabbing a drink before bed,” she says, jiggling the glass in her hand so the water inside sloshes about a little bit. “Why is your guitar…?”

Hina’s still got her guitar strapped around her shoulders, the neck of it sticking out dangerously. Doesn’t she know to take better care of her things? Honestly…

“I thought we could play together!” Hina says leaning forwards on the countertop, “You know — we never do that, but now that we’re both really good, we should totally do it!! I’ve been trying to learn a whole bunch of duet songs, and you’ll be able to pick them up real easy too, and and —”

The neck of Hina’s guitar hits the cupcake box, and sends them hurtling to the floor. The paper box crumples on impact, the cupcakes smash against the ground, and then there’s icing splattered all over the kitchen tiles.

Ah. Once again, those cupcakes she’d worked so hard to make are ruined. Even the bad ones.

Hina stops mid-sentence, makes a little choked noise and tries to laugh it off, nervous as she sounds.

“Ahaha, oops…”

Sayo bends down and starts to scoop the cupcakes back into the box. There’s seven left in the box. Ah. That’s a shame.

“Uhm, sorry, _onee-chan_ …”

The icing is smudged all over the floor. She’ll have to clean that up. It seems that buttercream frosting is particularly easy to smear. Ah. That’s a shame.

“You know, I’m sure you can just make another batch, after all, ‘cause they were so easy for you this time and all…”

Easy? They weren’t easy. Baking isn’t something to comes to Sayo naturally. Not that anything ever does. She doesn’t understand. She _never_ understands.

“Besides, there’s still some left! So it’s no big deal, right?”

Hina reaches out to grab Sayo’s wrist, and tug her towards the stairs.

“Come on, let’s go play together! I’m sure it’ll get your mind off of things; I even picked out some Roselia-like songs because I know you like that sort of thing, and it’ll be so easy for you to pick them up —”

Sayo snatches her hand away from Hina, cutting her off.

“Not everything is _easy_ for me like it is for you, Hina!” Sayo yells, and Hina’s lips press a firm line. “Everything I do I have to work for, but then you come along and _ruin_ it, every time!”

Sayo’s voice raises to a scream, uncontrollably, as her feelings come spilling out.

“ _I never wanted you to learn guitar!”_

As soon as she says it, she sees the sparkle in Hina’s eyes crumple, dissipate into dust. She shouldn’t have said that. Her anger melts away, replaced by simmering guilt. She shouldn’t have said that.

Hina’s mouth curves into the saddest smile Sayo’s ever seen.

“Ahaha, is that so? Sorry for being a bother~” Hina says, and vanishes up the stairs like lightning.

She’s going to cry. Sayo can hear it in her voice. She hears the door slam, too. This is her fault.

She’s left alone in the kitchen with a dozen crumbling cupcakes and the knowledge that she’s a terrible, terrible person.

Sayo bends down again and picks up the cupcakes. She can’t leave a mess here.

* * *

Hina is avoiding her.

It’s obvious. No joyful _good morning onee-chan_ ; no leaping around the house with abandon. Hina slips outside with a meekness that sends shivers down Sayo’s spine. She’s gone before Sayo has even really woken up.

This is all her fault.

Well, of course it is. Nobody else yelled at Hina. Nobody else said those words. Nobody else hurt her.

Sayo takes herself off to school alone as usual. It’s not like she and Hina make a habit of walking together, but sometimes they tag along till the corner where they part. Nothing even close to a routine, but Sayo feels her absence something deep today. Her phone buzzes in her pocket, but she doesn’t check it.

It’ll be Tsugumi, saying good morning, like she always does.

_Sorry. I just want to be alone right now._

She feels bad for ignoring her, but she feels worse each time Hina’s face passes across the back of her mind. It eats at her through her stomach, a burning pain like acid shooting up her chest with every pang of guilt she feels.

She’s the worst, isn’t she? The cupcakes rattle in her backpack. All this for a few _cupcakes._ How pathetic.

Practise goes no smoother than school, either. Ako and Rinko are far too sensitive to Sayo’s poorly-disguised emotions, and they tiptoe around her like speaking too loudly might cause her to shout at them. She — she wouldn’t do that. Yukina ignores her, for the most part, with the exception of the occasional sideward glance, and a soft sigh whenever they need to restart. Lisa is by far the worst of them — she doesn’t change at all, instead just treating Sayo the same as always, even though there’s something _obviously_ wrong, and she hates standing in front of them whilst they all play pretend like nothing is, ands she hates herself for dragging down precious practise time, and forcing everyone else to waste theirs, and, and —

“Okay, that’s enough,” Yukina calls practise early, and Sayo’s face burns. It’s because of her — it’s absoutely because of her. “Sayo, are you feeling ill?”

Oh, of course. There’s no reason for them to assume anything else. She always puts up such a strong front. Ako darts up to her, dancing around her drum kit, and reaches up with a tiny hand to press against her forehead.

“Your forehead doesn’t feel too warm...does your stomach hurt?” she asks, with all too much sincerity and all of the kindness in the world in her voice.

Sayo wonders what it would have been like to have someone like Ako as her younger sister — kind, attentive, devoted, sweet, caring. Maybe things would have been different.

“A little,” Sayo lies, and she’s pretty sure she’s only convinced Ako and Yukina, but that’s enough. Lisa won’t say anything in front of everyone, and neither will Rinko.

“You can tell us when you’re not feeling well,” Yukina scolds her, gently, “part of practise is knowing when to rest. There’s no benefit to pushing yourself when you should be recovering.”

“...yes. I’m sorry,” Sayo replies, gripping the neck of her guitar a little too hard.

Cleaning up doesn’t take long, and they let her sit out for most of it. Truthfully, Sayo would rather be doing something, anything with her hands. If she’s sitting around doing nothing, that just leaves more room for her thoughts to stray. She’ll think of their fight, and of the awful thing she said, and the anger and regret inside her will burn a little hotter.

Rinko and Ako leave first, chattering about their videogame, and Yukina stands at the door, waiting for Lisa.

“Ah, Yukina, go on without me. I’ve got some things to take care of, kay?”

“Alright. See you at home, then,” Yukina says, turning her back and leaving. _See you at home_ , huh. Sayo supposes they do live next door to each other. All Sayo has to look forwards to at home is poisonous guilt, cupcake crumbs and the tension she created. How nice for some.

“Hey,” Lisa says, scooting closer to her, “what’s going on?”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Sayo says, and neither of them believe it.

Lisa exhales a hefty sigh, but looks over her shoulder at the balking Sayo, “Let’s go grab dinner, okay? I’ll shout you extra fries.”

Sayo is at her worst, and at her worst, she is a weak woman.

She’s taken to the nearest WcDonalds, and Lisa ushers her to sit down. “My treat,” she insists, and it goes against every one of Sayo’s principles but she sure can be pushy when she wants to, huh? It does help a little to be spared from talking to Aya and Kanon, who are of _course_ on shift tonight, but those worries leave her mind when Lisa places a tray of fries in front of her.

She’s eating them before she can even think about it. Lisa laughs at her, and Sayo feels even more rotten. She has no self-control. She’s shameless. She’s —

“So, hey,” Lisa’s voice takes on that soft tone she reserves for when Ako cries or when she (thinks she) is alone with Yukina. “What’s up, huh? Hina was kinda frazzled at school today, and you’ve been off all night. It’s not like you to make such a sad face.”

She’s sad?

Mm. Maybe that’s what this feeling is.

She sighs something painful, and all of the resistance left in her body leaves with her breath. Maybe she should follow her own advice — and talk to someone about it. After all, that’s what she told Tsugumi to do. She’d just be a hypocrite if she kept it all to herself.

And despite everything, maybe deep down, she really does want someone to tell her what to do to make things better.

Struggling by herself is all she’s ever done, but maybe it’ll hurt a little less if she lets just one person in. There’s no finer person for that than Lisa, she supposes. Lisa is...a special kind of kind.

Rather than speaking, instead Sayo pulls out her container of crushed cupcakes. She’s cleaned them up as best she can, but it’s evident they’ve been under duress. Lisa blinks.

“You made these?”

“Yes, I — “ she swallows, “I wanted to make them for Roselia. I wanted to try something other than just cookies. Hazawa-san helped me — it took two tries to get them right, but we did it. I took them home, and Hina knocked them onto the floor, and I — “

The lump in her throat swells, and she has to fight back that overwhelming, overpowering guilt. There’s been cracks in her facade all day but now there’s cracks in her voice too, and her hands are shaking a little bit too much, and this is all — this is all too much —

“I yelled at her,” she squeaks out, “I told her I never wanted her to play guitar. I said such a horrible thing, Imai-san.”

She goes quiet, and stares down at her lap, fists clenched tight enough to leave crescent marks on her palms. This is all her fault. If she’d just had a bit more _patience_ — if she’d just put her own stupid feelings aside for one second she could have stopped herself, and none of this would have happened, and she’d never have had to see Hina look like that, and —

“Ah,” Sayo lifts her head as Lisa’s arms wrap around her. She’s warm. She’s so, so warm.

She hates to admit it to herself, but maybe she’s crying.

“Hey,” Lisa says, rubbing soothing circles into the tense muscles of Sayo’s back, “it’s gonna be okay. You didn’t mean it.”

She — she didn’t. She really didn’t. Why would she say something so awful in the heat of the moment?

“You can fix this,” Lisa continues, “so don’t cry, okay? You can talk to Hina, and smooth things over. She’ll listen — she loves you.”

The most comforting thing Lisa’s said all night is also the one that hurts the most. _She loves you._ Of course she does. Sayo’s never doubted that for a second, even with all the hurt Hina’s caused her.

And Hina’s her baby sister — despite everything, despite how much _better_ Hina is at everything and anything, despite how blasé she is about everything Sayo’s had to work for — Sayo loves her.

How could she have done something to make Hina doubt that?

“Every time I try to talk to her she runs away from me,” Sayo says, voice thick, “I wouldn’t even know what to say.”

“Maybe she needs time, yeah?” Lisa says, and she’s right, probably, “it gave her a bit of a shock. I know she’ll come around.”

“Mm.”

After Sayo’s stopped being pathetic, Lisa lets her go, and Sayo goes back to hunching her shoulders and munching on fries. They’re getting a little cold. She doesn’t care.

“Do you want me to talk to her for you?” Lisa offers, and Sayo knows she means well, but —

“No,” she says, chest hollow, “I need to — I need to fix this on my own. But thank you.”

“Okay,” Lisa rests her cheek in her palm, “but if you need anything, just ask, okay?”

Sayo probably won’t take her up on that, but she appreciates the sentiment regardless.

“Thank you, Imai-san,” she says, as she finishes her fries, “my head’s a little clearer now. I’ll see — what I can do.”

“Anytime!” Lisa says, with her huge, usual smile, “I mean that, yeah?”

They part ways at the crossing, and Sayo makes the rest of the journey home on her own. It’s getting a little dark out — she warned her parents she wouldn’t be home for dinner, but they’d still worry if she were out too late.

Being out late does have its advantages, though — less awkward tension spent in the room across from Hina’s, less time roiling in her own discomfort. She tepidly opens the door, and looks around to find the coast clear. Her parents are sitting in the living room, watching television. Up the stairs, Hina’s door is shut.

How ironic, Sayo thinks. All these years she’s spent telling Hina to close her bedroom door when she’s being noisy, and now all she wants is for it to be open again. It would restore some semblance of normalcy — anything.

Maybe Lisa’s right — maybe if she did talk to her, and apologised properly then she and Hina could find their normal again and settle back into their uneasy sibling rhapsody. Or instead, perhaps, Hina could give her that sad smile again, and Sayo’s heart would shrivel up like the little black thing it is.

Part of her wants to blame Hina for all this — because Hina ruined her cupcakes, because Hina was always so good at everything, because Hina always trumped her achievements, because Hina never _thought_ about her feelings. Because it would be easier to shift the blame onto someone else, so she doesn’t have to face up to the fact that it was her fault she pushed her own horrible feelings onto Hina. That she made Hina think it was her fault. That’s it’s really, really not.

Tsugumi’s been messaging her — another one pops up in her phone’s notifications. She doesn’t really feel worthy of it right now. Sayo doesn’t mean it, but she wishes Tsugumi would leave her alone.

It’s the only light in her room, she realises. She’s been standing here in the dark for minutes now, bereft.

Instead of doing something about it, Sayo lies down in her bed and rots.

* * *

The next morning, Hina is out of the house before Sayo’s even managed to drag herself downstairs. She’s not normally a morning person, so — mm. Her door was open, and her guitar still in her room. That’s even more strange. It’s Thursday, so Hina would definitely have practise.

Her throat closes up, and she wonders if she should say something — call her. Hina is forgetful, but she’d never forget her guitar. But — maybe they’d have a guitar at her studio. They probably do. So maybe Hina just didn’t feel like taking it today — does she even take it normally? Sayo’s always left before her, so — she doesn’t know.

There’s an emptiness to the kitchen that she’s never quite felt before. It feels like Hina will stumble down the stairs at any moment, but she won’t. It feels like Hina’s running away from her.

Still, isn’t that what she did, for years and years? She’s always left the house earlier than Hina. Maybe this is how Hina felt. Maybe this is her just desserts.

Sayo clutches a hand at that chest of hers that’s aching so sombrely now. It hurts.

_I didn’t realise all of this was hurting you so much. Why didn’t you say anything? Why did you just tolerate it all with a smile and a shrug?_

But she’s a hypocrite for asking that, isn’t she?

After all, she’s the one who never said anything. Maybe they were so busy trying to be considerate of the other’s feelings that they never bothered to voice their own.

So maybe she should respect that — that Hina did this for _her_ , and that because Sayo finally spoke the hurt that had built up inside her all those years, she was finally able to do something about it. It’s not like she’s unaware how much Hina’s been trying — fruitlessly, endlessly — to do something to cure her sour expression.

Hina is insensitive, but kind, and maybe for once Sayo should let that kindness be instead of doing everything she can to refuse it. Perhaps this can be their new start, where they neatly step around each other instead of crashing into each other and hurting one another, over and over. Maybe it’s for the best.

It still feels wrong in her chest, though, and that feelings lingers through her morning classes and into lunchtime. Normally she’d eat with Rinko, but today she excuses herself. Today — she’d rather eat alone.

“Hikawa-san,” a voice Sayo doesn’t normally hear addressing her comes around the corner, filled with venom and spitfire, politely concealed behind a hundred layers of professionalism. It sends chills down her spine, as Chisato Shirasagi rounds the building, stopping right in front of her. Aya Maruyama trails behind her, nervously as ever, reaching out a hand.

“Chisato-chan, don’t — “

“Explain to me why Hina-san is leaving Pasupare,” Chisato says, a smile on her lips but nowhere else in her expression. Sayo’s eyes widen.

“She’s,” she swallows, “what?”

“Yesterday evening, Hina gave notice of her termination, effective immediately,” Chisato’s eyes narrow, “She was upset and evasive, uncharacteristically so — and this only happens when you are involved.”

“Chisato-chan, I don’t think she knows — “

Aya fumbles for words, eyes darting between the two of them like a frightened animal, as if unsure of whether or not speaking would earn her ire.

Sayo clenches her teeth.

“Hina is her own person,” Sayo grinds out, jaw set firm, “and she can make her own decisions. Do not accuse me of obstructing her agency. If you are unable to accept her wishes, then do not take it out on me.”

“You are her sister,” Chisato says, relenting, but not for weakness, “and she will listen to you. Ensure that she returns to Pasupare.”

Chisato Shirasagi turns on her heel, and leaves an aggravated Sayo behind with a nervous Aya.

“U-um,” Aya stutters, “I’m so, so sorry about that. Hina leaving all of a sudden caught us all by surprise, and we’re not really sure what to do about it…”

Sayo sighs and sits back down on her bench. Any energy she might have had left over has since dissipated from her body, and her expression falls to dismay. Aya notices.

“Um, are you alright?”

“I’m,” Sayo hesitates, and looks at Aya’s puppy-dog eyes, and thinks about how much she looks just like Hina with that kind of expression, and — oh, she gives up. “No, not really.”

“Is it about Hina-chan?” Aya sits down next to her, a strangely comforting, reassuring-despite-it-all glint in her eyes.

“Yes.”

“What happened?”

So Sayo tells her — of cupcakes, of guitar, of sibling rivalries and everything unfair she’s said to Hina. Of stupid, stupid cupcakes.

“Ohh,” Aya says, in that way that people who don’t really know how to respond to things say it. This is why Sayo doesn’t like talking to people about her problems — how are people meant to react? Simple ‘I’m so sorry’s are empty at best, and hardly anyone has the right words to speak without creating awkward silences and guilty pauses.

“Mm, she’s probably really sad right now, huh?” Aya offers. It’s a start.

“She won’t even speak to me. I can’t exactly blame her.”

“I don’t think she’s angry — just scared.”

“Scared?”

Aya tilts her head with a small smile. “Yeah. She loves you a lot, you know? I think she’s scared that what happened has jeopardized your relationship. She didn’t realise what she was doing was hurting you. She’s probably scared she’s going to hurt you more.”

“That’s…” Sayo...hadn’t even considered that. Wouldn’t she be angry? Wouldn’t she be hurt? What about Hina’s feelings? “...shouldn’t she be angry at me?”

“I dunno if she could ever really be angry at you, Sayo-san.”

Aya’s right, and that’s what makes it all the harder to accept. If Hina isn’t angry, then she’s — she’s just hurt. There’s no punishment for Sayo in that. That doesn’t help Hina feel any better. It just makes Hina feel sad. It just makes Sayo feel sad.

“I think if you go and talk to her properly, she’ll listen. She really does love you.”

_And I love her too._

Aya’s right — she’s right. Just like Lisa was right. Just like that small voice inside Sayo was right, urging her out of inaction when every muscle in her body is begging for her to do nothing, and suffer the consequences she’s brought unto herself. No, she has to fix this — she _will_ fix this.

She never wanted Hina to stop something she loved, just for Sayo’s sake.

“Thank you, Maruyama-san,” Sayo says, voice thick with worry but steadily determined regardless. “I promise I’ll talk to her — I’ll try to make her see reason, so she comes back. I don’t think she wanted to quit.”

“Ahaha,” Aya’s laugh is nervous, and she’s back to her easily-intimidated self. That Lisa-like persona has vanished. “I hope so. I really liked being in a band with her. It was fun. Even if she makes fun of me, she’s a good and kind friend.”

“Mm,” Sayo says, smiling softly, “I’d be inclined to agree.”

Aya leaves her alone after a few minutes of smalltalk, and Sayo is once again left to eat her lunch in peace. There can’t be much left of their break — but more importantly, she needs to message Hina.

Sayo: Hina, I need to apologise to you — in person. Can I meet with you after school? I’ll treat you to sweets.

She waits until the end of her lunch, but there’s no response. A spike of fear rises in her stomach, but she quells it as best she can. She has to do this. No matter. Hina’s met her after school a hundred times, so she can hardly complain if Sayo tries to do the same, right?

She still hasn’t responded to Tsugumi, though. What if she sees her? What if Tsugumi is worried about her, like Sayo knows she will be? Oh, no. She can’t — just leave Tsugumi hanging like that.

She hides her hands beneath her desk, keeping her eyes firmly pinned on the teacher, typing out a message at an excruciatingly slow pace. Thankfully, he’s too distracted writing up an equation on the board.

Sayo: I’m sorry I haven’t been responsive. Hina and I had a fight, and I’ve been doing a lot of thinking.

She sends it and stashes it back away in her pocket before the teacher turns around, and she’s safe. It’s not like she hasn’t texted Tsugumi in class before, but something about the everything going on in her brings an anxiety to the forefront, as if she’d need to worry about being scolded or having it confiscated on top of everything.

Moments later, her phone buzzes, and Sayo throws anxiety to the wayside because — oh.

tsugu: that’s okay!! i hope things get better soon :c  
tsugu: also, sayo-san…  
tsugu: pay attention in class >:c

Sayo doesn’t know how to feel about being scolded by someone younger than her, especially when she’s in the disciplinary committee herself. She’s really fallen from grace. This is the absolute worst.

Even so, for some reason it makes her smile. Something about talking to Tsugumi lifts her heart just a little.

* * *

Haneoka is a startlingly big school, now that she thinks about it. It’s not like she hasn’t been here before — to culture festivals, or events, or to pick Hina up for various things. It just feels a little uncomfortable to be here, in her Hanasakigawa uniform amongst the sea of grey. She recognises some of the faces in the sea emerging from the school grounds — Maya, a girl from Pastel Palettes, Kaoru, Chisato’s friend, and — oh, Afterglow.

“Sayo-san!!” Himari’s shrill voice breaks the chatter of the crowd as she bounds up to her, rocking on the balls of her feet with a huge grin on her face. “Hi!!”

“Good afternoon, Uehara-san,” Sayo says, taking a step backwards to recreate the personal space Himari had just invaded.

“Here to see Tsugu?” she asks, stepping closer again, “She’s a little busy with school council work today, but —” A hand clamps over Himari’s mouth.

“Hi. Ma. Ri,” Tomoe says, yoinking Himari back a few steps, an eyebrow arched. Sayo exhales just a little in relief. Her personal space, finally respected. “Are you bothering Sayo-san?”

“No!”

Yes.

“Maybe.”

“It’s fine, Tomoe-san,” Sayo sighs, rubbing her temples, “I’m just waiting for Hina, actually.”

“Hina?” Tomoe looks inside the school gates, pointing with her thumb over her shoulder “uh, I think she’s currently climbing a tree?”

“Ugh,” If she could rub her temples any harder, Sayo would, “thank you.”

Himari and Tomoe wave at her as they leave, and Sayo turns inside the gates to find a small crowd of people beneath the largest tree in the school grounds. The same tree whose branches her baby sister is now scaling, ten feet off the ground.

“Oh, Sayo!” Lisa waves her over, “what brings you here?”

Every time Hina climbs another branch, the entire tree shakes. This is — absolutely not safe. What if she falls?

“I was looking for Hina,” Sayo says, stopping beside Lisa and — Yukina, who is staring upwards at the tree very intensely. “What’s going on here, exactly?”

“Yukina found a cat stuck up this tree,” Lisa gestures to one of the upper, where Sayo can just scarcely see a ginger coat peeking out from amongst the leaves. “Hina offered to climb up and rescue it.”

“Hina!” Sayo calls, cupping her hands around your mouth, “Be careful!”

Hina pauses in her ascent to look down, and her eyes go wide when they meet Sayo’s. She gives her this funny, pained little smile that sends daggers through Sayo’s heart. Well — she’s here to fix that, to apologise. Just not in front of the entire Haneoka school body, perhaps.

Yukina’s staring up at Hina with worried expression, and — a blush in her cheeks? Her fists are clenched in front of her, eyes focused entirely on the cat. It’s a pretty white one, its claws digging into the bark. Hina’s almost at the top of the tree, reaching her arms out to the kitty and gently prying it from its perch. It scrambles from her arms and down the tree, until Yukina scoops it up and coos at it. Sayo sighs — well, that’s that. The cat is safe, and now Hina can come down.

Tsugu darts over, stopping in front of Lisa — “Sorry, I couldn’t find the gym’s ladder — ah.”

She smiles and waves at Sayo, like it’s not at all strange for her to be here. Instead, if anything, she’s got a sweet, knowing look on her face.

“Looks like the cat’s safe and sound,” Tsugu says, “that’s a relief.”

If Yukina was paying attention, she doesn’t give any indication, because she cuddles the cat closer to her body. It seems perfectly content to snuggle up to her.

“Hina, can you get down okay?” Lisa calls, ever the only brains aside from Sayo herself in any situation, ever. “You alright?”

“I’m perfectly fi—”

Hina’s leg snags in the crook between a branch and the trunk, and her face shifts from cheery to shocked in a split-second. Her body falls the ground, and all Sayo hears is a loud, sickening crunch.

In an instant, Hina is curled on the ground, clutching at her arm, tears streaming down her face, and it’s like the world stops for everyone but them.

“Hina!? Hina!” Sayo yells, probably louder than necessary but she doesn’t care, because all of that anxiety in her heart comes bursting out, and she rushes over and falls to her knees to look at her baby sister, cradling her arm because — oh no, oh no no no arms shouldn’t _look_ like that.

“I’ll go get a teacher!” Tsugu says, the first to affirmative action in any kind of situation. Hina looks up at Sayo with wet, bleary eyes.

“It hurts, _onee-chan_ ,” she whimpers, hiding her face in Sayo’s lap. Sayo grasps Hina’s good hand, and holds it tightly.

“I’m here, Hina,” she says, straining her head for things to say that would be helpful, “try not to move it. We’ll get you to the hospital and it’ll stop hurting, I promise.”

She doesn’t know if it would help, but Hina nods solemnly, and sobs into Sayo’s knees. She doesn’t know what to do other than hold her dear, baby sister as she cries.

Hina calls for her a hundred times, and a hundred times Sayo reassures her she’s still here, she won’t leave, until Tsugu comes back with a teacher in tow. It’s not far to the hospital, but Hina’s in agony — she grits her teeth as Sayo helps her to stand, doesn’t complain as she’s strapped into her seatbelt and her teacher drives gently, so gently.

They arrive at the hospital, and Sayo calls her parents, and Hina’s taken into the hospital to have her arm straightened and put into a cast. It’s a proper break, the doctor says. She’ll need to have it in a cast for at the very least six weeks. When she comes out, it’s past seven in the evening, and her tears are dried, but it’s not until their parents have taken them home and grilled them to their satisfaction that they’re left alone. Normally at this hour, Sayo would retreat into her room and lock the door, but — seeing Hina so vulnerable made her feel like she can’t possibly leave her alone.

“Hina,” Sayo pauses at her door, hovering nervously between the no man’s land of the hallway and her room, “can I come in?”

Hina looks at her with wide eyes.

“Mm,” she says, and her voice is back to normal, no longer choked up with crying.

It’s been a long time since Sayo’s really been inside Hina’s room — it looks a little different. The wallpaper’s a different colour, she’s got a new bedspread, everything’s been moved around. All of her plushes are still on her bed, though. Shirokuma-san, Kurokuma-san, and everyone else.

Sayo sits herself down on the bed, unsure of what to say or how she’s going to say it but she can’t waste this opportunity. This is her only chance to fix things with Hina. With quivering hands, she —

“Do you really feel like that?” Hina says, quietly, sitting down on the floor in front of Sayo. “All the time?”

She’s holding her heart with her good hand, and oh, of course, Hina wants to fix this as much as she does. Deep down — even after everything is done, she still loves her.

“No,” Sayo says, ruffing Hina’s hair, the traces of a smile tugging at her lips until they curve upwards, an awful, lopsided, but genuine thing.

“Are you lying to make me feel better?”

“No!” She’s not — she’s really not. She doesn’t feel like her world is caving in all the time, because there are good and happy times interspersed between those periods of hurt. Roselia, the Tanabata festival, school culture festivals, cookies and — all of it. “I wouldn’t do that.”

“Oh.” Hina stares at her feet, flexing her toes as if to have something else to focus on. She’s scarily — thoughtfully quiet.

“It just gets bad sometimes,” and oh, it’s all spilling out, but maybe this is something she should have told Hina a long time ago. “like when our parents go to see your lives, and not mine.”

“I go to your lives all the time,” Hina says, looking up at Sayo, green eyes wide. Sayo rubs her temples.

“Didn’t I tell you not to?” She’s not upset, though, not really. If anything, it sparks a little flare of happiness inside her chest. “Wait, but I’ve never seen you…?”

“Ahaha,” Hina rubs the back of her head, “I go in disguise. I like seeing you on stage, ‘cause you seem so much happier.”

She pauses, worrying her lip.

“I never really get to see you happy. I don’t know — how to make you happy.”

“Hina…”

She’s been worrying about this all this time? That’s…

Sayo has to laugh. All this time, she’s been worried about her own feelings, and here Hina’s been, trying to think of ways to make her smile. She slides down off the bed, sitting on the floor instead and resting her back against the bed. Hina looks at her, surprised, so Sayo pats her lap. Hina’s hesitant, at first, but she lies down against Sayo, and Sayo’s arms fall around her. How long since they’ve hugged like this? Too long.

“I just, um,” Hina fumbles for words, “I don’t really know what to do, you know? I’m bad with people. That was always what you were good at. I made kids cry, and I still do! Kinda. Like Aya.”

Has she…? Has she really been good at that? Sayo’s never thought of her people skills as anything particularly special, but perhaps to Hina — who’s never really gotten people at all — maybe she appears a little bit extraordinary. Huh. Even still, Sayo’s not nearly as amazing as Hina thinks she is.

“I’ve made more people cry than I’m proud of. I made you cry.”

“Have I ever made you cry?”

“Lots.”

“Oh…”

Hina looks particular downcast at that one, but — it’s not all bad. Sayo places a hand on top of Hina’s head, rubbing gently.

“I don’t hate it all the time,” she says, and her voice goes a little softer than normal. “i try to use that feeling to push myself to work harder.”

She releases a breath she didn’t realise she’d been holding, because — it’s true. Normally, when things aren’t interrupted or changed or different, she sits down and takes it because what else is she meant to do? Give up? That’d just hurt the both of them.

“You’re strong, _onee-chan_.”

Hina sinks into her a little more, and there’s a stray trace of wonder in her voice. Sayo smiles.

“I have to be. I’m your big sister, right?”

“Right!!” Hina beams up at her, and Sayo could stop right now and things would be perfect, her baby sister is smiling and happy again but there’s one more thing she needs to fix — even if the guilt in her chest is eroding away at her.

“Hey, Hina…” Sayo starts, and she’s fumbling for her words because even though she’s thought this through a hundred times, none of it compares to the real thing, not really.

“Mm?” Hina’s as bubbly as ever, perfectly content to cuddle with her big sister and sit in happy silence. But —

“Please don’t quit guitar. Or Pastel*Palettes.”

She has to address the elephant in the room — that awful thing she said. Hina’s breath shudders for a second, and Sayo feels guilt stab into her.

“I thought you wanted that to be your thing,” she says, measured, cautious. “I don’t mind.”

What gets her is the heartbreaking _honesty_ in Hina’s voice — if Sayo let her, she would give it up, just like that. Sayo — Sayo can’t let that happen.

“ _I_ mind,” she says, creasing her brow, “I — you’ve been happy too. Playing guitar with your band has been fun, right?”

“Mm,” Hina considers it for a second, but smiles, “it’s been fun. I like Aya-chan, and Chisato-chan, and Eve-chan and Maya-chan too. They’re all so weird. None of them are like you, but that’s okay. I like Aya-chan most, I think.”

 _None of them are like you, but that’s okay._ Oh Hina...did she really want to interact with more people like Sayo? Truly? But — there she goes, mentioning Aya again.

It occurs to Sayo, right then and there, that maybe Hina’s found someone she likes, too.

“You do talk about her a lot.”

“Do I??” Hina looks positively flabbergasted. Oh dear.

“Yes,” Sayo says, flatly.

“Huh...I never noticed.”

“I think your self-awareness could use some work, perhaps,” Sayo says, but she doesn’t really, truly mean it. If anything, it’s fond, and Hina seems to get it just fine, giggling to herself. Their shaky communication is getting a little better, maybe. “but, you look so happy whenever you talk about them — any of them.”

“Mm. I am happy.” There’s a warmth to Hina’s voice, that spreads to Sayo’s chest and peels away at all the guilt that’s festered there.

“So don’t quit,” Sayo says, firmly.

_Please._

“You don’t want me to quit?”

“I don’t.”

“Even if it hurts you?”

“Even if it hurts me.”

Hina’s quiet, thoughtful for a moment. Sayo tilts her head, but then Hina repeats herself.

“You’re strong, _onee-chan_.”

“Mm.” Maybe she is. After all, she’s an older sister. It’s her job to be strong, and look after her baby sister. Even if they’re the same age, even if they’re twins.

“...I won’t quit, but, uh...it might be hard to play with this…” Hina wiggles her broken arm about and winces as she realises that yeah, it’s still broken, and yeah, it still hurts. Sayo holds her shoulders, hesitant to reach out but wanting to snap Hina out of her own stupidity.

“Ah, your cast…” Sayo frowns, “You might not be able to play for quite a few weeks.”

“Ahaha, my manager is gonna be sooo mad if I can’t play,” Hina says, grinning like it’s not a problem, although it definitely, absolutely is. Sayo feels her blood pressure spike. “We have a live in like, two or three weeks.”

“You had a live soon and you went tree-climbing??”

“Yukina-chan wanted me to get the kitty down! She looked so sad onee-chan. How am I meant to say no when she’s about to burst into tears?”

Sayo frowns. That doesn’t sound right, but she doesn’t know enough about Yukina to dispute it.

“Oh, oh, I know!” Hina leaps up onto two feet, turning on her heels to face Sayo, “ _Onee-chan_ , why don’t you play?”

Sayo blinks.

“Eh?”

“Yeah!!” Hina’s pacing her room in circles now, a bubbly bounce in her step, “Listen, you look a lot like me. We could just say I got extensions and now I’m like, a little bit taller and prettier!”

Sayo heaves a sigh. _She thinks I’m prettier than her? Oh, Hina…_ Still, this sort of idea is just — ridiculous. There’s no way it could

“I don’t think that would work.”

Hina is absolutely undeterred. “Please? I’ll ask my manager, I bet it’ll be fine!!” Already, she texting who Sayo presumes is her manager. How she manages to be so dextrous with one arm in a cast, Sayo doesn’t know.

“Look! She says it’s fine!”

Sayo blinks. “She responded that quickly!?”

“Yup!! Come on, I know I’ve been asking for a lot of things lately, but I’d really like it if you could meet them. They’re really interesting people! You already know Aya-chan and Chisato-chan from school, right?”

“I...we’ll see.”

“Yay!!!” Hina jumps for joy, landing with a thud, and spinning in circles with glee. “Aah, I’m so excited!! You’re gonna look so good in an idol costume!!”

“Idol costume!?”

Once again, maybe like always, Sayo’s getting swept up in Hina’s rhythm and dragged around. Maybe this time she doesn’t mind, so long as they’re both happy. Hina’s got the biggest smile on her face Sayo’s seen in years, and — she really can’t say no to anything when she looks like that, can she?

When Sayo finally manages to pry herself from Hina’s excitement, she collapses into her own bed, and checks her phone for the first time in hours. There’s just one new message — from Tsugumi.

NEW MESSAGE  
tsugu: i hope hina’s okay!! don’t feel pressured to respond anytime soon, okay? take your time.

Even after everything, Tsugumi’s still there for her.

Sayo: She’s fine now. Thank you so much for your help today. I wasn’t able to think straight.

In truth, it was Tsugumi, wasn’t it, who made sure everything went smoothly? Tsugumi fetched the teacher, Tsugumi handled everyone back at school, and Tsugumi helped Sayo help Hina into the car. Sayo owers her a lot. She’s so reliable.

Her phone pings, almost instantly, and Sayo unlocks her phone at the speed of light.

tsugu: i’m so glad!! did you get to talk about that thing with her? i hope things are okay on that front too :c  
Sayo: I did. It went well, I think, but I may have been dragged into performing for Pastel*Palettes.  
tsugu: omg that’s so exciting!! omg….will minato-san be okay with it…  
Sayo: Oh my gosh I haven’t even asked her. Oh my gosh. Oh she is absolutely not going to be okay with it.  
tsugu: chin up!! :> i’m sure you can convince her.  
tsugu: i’m sure you’ll look super cute in an idol costume, too

Sayo resists the urge to repeat her mistake and throw her phone at the wall.

Sayo: I most certainly will not!  
tsugu: really :o? because i think you’d look cute no matter what you’d wear c:

Instead, she drops her phone and screams into her pillow.

tsugu: fhdj im sorry for teasing!!  
Sayo: It’s fine. My face isn’t red right now at all. In fact, I have no idea what you were talking about at all.  
tsugu: pfffft  
tsugu: hey...if you’d like, we could try and make cupcakes again sometime next week? or cookies, or an actual cake! i found an old recipe book and i’d love to try some with you!

Sayo smiles something genuinely, resting her chin in her palm. Tsugumi really is...quite sweet, isn’t she.

Sayo: Don’t forget we need to go apron-shopping too.  
tsugu: i haven’t forgotten!!! does tuesday work for you?  
Sayo: Tuesday it is.  
tsugu: i’m looking forward to it :>!

Sayo sighs, closing her phone and plugging it in for the night. Baking and apron-shopping on Tuesday, huh? That sounds pretty nice. Maybe she can make Hina some proper apology baking. What would she like? Cookies, with the nice frosting? Or a big cake, probably. Perhaps Tsugumi has a fancy chocolate cake recipe? Oh, that sounds really good…

She still needs to somehow convince Yukina to let her perform with Pastel*Palettes, and do so without letting Lisa know, because otherwise she will never live it down. Still, an idol band, huh…?

Maybe she could bake something to thank Aya for talking to her. Yeah, that could work. She’ll need to thank Lisa too, but baking her something impressive would be a little more difficult, but — hey.

Maybe she messed up, but perhaps — perhaps things are going to be okay. Even if she’s in an idol costume, in front of twenty thousand people on stage.

Oh god.

What has Sayo gotten herself into?

**Author's Note:**

> thank you so much for reading until the end!!! as ur reward here's a really really funny comment from my friend jess about this fic:
> 
> sayo, languishing in misery out in the open: ohhhhh if only someone with emotional intelligence could give me some idea of how to fix things.... a script perhaps  
> lisa poking her corpse with a stick: yo you need to learn how to do this shit wake up bitch
> 
> sincerely though thank you so much!!!! it was a mission and a joy to write and finish this fic, and i'm glad you were able to enjoy it c: again, i'd love to hear your thoughts so please leave a comment!!


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